Cote: 15 years later, Dolphins Cancer Challenge is the life-saving legacy of Jim Mandich

Miami Herald

20-02-2025

Jim Mandich was dying, and he knew it. Bile duct cancer was taking his life, by degrees. It was aggressive, and the prognosis was grim.
I last saw Mandich in the Miami Dolphins lockerroom after a game in the midst of the 2010 season. I knew he was battling cancer but did not then know any details, or that he would leave us by the following spring at age 62. He looked thin. I asked how he was doing. He answered with a wan smile and two words that had a haunting double meaning I've never forgotten.
'Never better,' he said.
The Dolphins were then planning a fundraiser in Mandich's honor to raise money for cancer research. The event would be in November of that year, starting at the football stadium. It would be a 170-mile bike ride over two days.
Mandich, weakened by the cancer, rode only a ceremonial lap around the stadium.
'You could tell how gaunt he was, but he was sure as hell determined he was gonna be there at the start,' Michael Mandich, his son, recalled Wednesday. 'And he was there at finish line.'
It was the dying and death of Mandich, the Dolphins glory-days tight end and popular longtime local broadcaster, that inspired what would become the annual Dolphins Cancer Challenge, and the 15th edition -- the DCC XV -- is this Saturday.
Because of Mandich and in his eternal memory has grown a South Florida institution in cancer research, with the Dolphins out front in showing other professional sports teams how best to serve the community that supports them.
The Dolphins Cancer Challenge is now the NFL's largest team-affiliated fundraiser as it celebrates its 15-year milestone having raised more than $75 million since 2010. (In 2020 the Dolphins pledged to reach the $75M goal by 2026 and did it two years early, in '24.)
All participant-raised funds go directly to the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami to fund lifesaving cancer research.
That first event in 2010 saw some 400 trailblazing participants raise $533,000. In 2024, the DCC had more than 6,700 participants and raised about $12.5 million, both records that they hope to top on Saturday. Those involved may do so as individuals or as part of corporate teams or personal teams.
Every year, hundreds of cancer survivors are among the multitude of supporters.
The Challenge began as a cycling-only event held during the NFL season, with participants biking 170 miles over two days. And credit Dolphins president and CEO at the time, Mike Dee, for getting behind the idea. It now is held annually each February and has evolved to four different distances in cycling from 13 to 99 miles, plus a 5K (3.1-mile) walk or run.
The event has enjoyed the wide support of the franchise itself, ownership to players to staff. Head coach Mike McDaniel is peddling a bike every year. Players Jaelan Phillips and Braxton Berrios serve on the organization's board. Prominent alumni including Hall of Famers Dan Marino and Zach Thomas will ride Saturday. Several ex-Dolphins playing for rival teams also return for the event. One, Bills' receiver Mack Hollins, rides 99 miles for the cause every year and will again Saturday.
Mandich's son Michael, now 41, helped run the event in its early days and still participates every year. He leads Team Mad Dog, named after his late father's nickname.
'It had a special feeling even from the beginning, and it quickly took off,' he says of the event. 'It has a Field of Dreams type of attitude. It's hard for any living soul to not know a person who's been affected by cancer.'
Today, the chair of the DCC's board of directors is Elizabeth (Liz) Jenkins, the widow of Jason Jenkins, the former Dolphins senior vice president of communications and community affairs who died unexpectedly of a blood clot in August 2022. The annual Cancer Challenge was dear to him, but Liz was taken aback when soon after his death the club invited her to take over leadership of the event.
'It was probably the best yes I ever said besides saying yes to [Jason,],' she told us Wednesday.
The Dolphins Cancer Challenge, her third as chair, is her Super Bowl.
She feels that running it enables her to grow her husband's legacy of commitment to the community.
'Jason wanted to bring people together, people from all walks of life,' she said. 'He was always about giving back to the community. And cancer doesn't look at age or socio-economics or anything. It can affect anybody.'
Jason had signed up to bike the 99-mile event just before he died. His widow took his place.
'It was the hardest thing physically I had ever done,' she said. 'I'm a crossfitter, but at about 80 miles I hit a wall.'
She pushed through at the finish line, where emotion overwhelmed her. The physical pain. The accomplishment. The still-raw grief over her loss.
'I burst into tears. I could not stop crying.'
As Liz Jenkins works to nurture her late husband's legacy of community service, Michael Mandich can relate.
Jim Mandich was an accomplished athlete, a star at Michigan who played his entire 1970s NFL career with the Dolphins before a final season in Pittsburgh. He helped win Super Bowl rings in Miami's 1972 Perfect Season and again in '73.
He might have been even better in broadcasting, player, as a radio sports-talk host for WIOD and later for WQAM, also doing color commentary on Dolphins radio broadcasts.
But his most enduring legacy may be that he inspired the Dolphins Cancer Challenge that celebrates its 15th year Saturday.
'There's a generation that remembers my father from football, or maybe as announcer, but that '72 season was 53 years ago,' says Michael. 'Those memories will fade. But in another 15 or 20 or 30 years from now this event will still take place and perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars will have been raised largely inspired by my father. What better memory would anyone ever have for him?'